Art 3 Final Portfolio

1) This project, Crossing the Yellow Brick Road, I view as my most successful. The theme of this project was intertextuality: the message of an image is changed when another image is added with it. I used a wood board and cut it into the shape of a cross walk sign. I painted this board yellow with yellow enamel to make it have a shiny finish like a normal cross walk sign. For the crosswalk people I made a stencil and spray painted them black. I used a certain technique for the spray paint where I had to use sticks to hold down the part of the stencil that I was spray painting to make sure there were no fuzzy lines.

I decided the most effective way to display this project that would make a lasting effect was to make the sign out of a wood board. I could have just as easily done this sign on a piece of paper but it wouldn't have given it the realistic effect I wanted. The realistic look of this project gives it the most ironic outcome.

2) The project in which I overcame the most obstacles was the perspective project. I had such a mental artistic block with this project. I didn't want to do the traditional perspective drawing, I wanted to do something innovative and clever. I had many ideas in my head and I spent many days planning and getting the ideas down on paper. By the end of all that planning I decided that I didn't even like or I didn't know how to carry out the ideas I spent all that time on. I then did what I refused to do at first, a traditional perspective drawing. BUT I used reference of a picture I took while at the Ringling Museum that I think is a very different kind of perspective shot. I also decided to do this drawing in a medium I am not familiar with, colored pencil. Thus I have learned I do not particularly like working with colored pencils. I have learned this by DREADING every time I need to work on this project. But through all this I persevered through and became a better artist. 3) I learned new techniques and grew as an artist in my layering piece. I learned that you can transfer the color of tissue paper if the tissue paper is wet in a water/glue solution. I increased in my drawing technique with this project because I practiced drawing the skeleton many times. I first dew it out in pencil while looking at a reference, then a fine tip pen, then a thick sharpie marker. My artistic vision for this piece was pretty loose, I didn't want it to look exactly perfect and thought out. Though the layering was pretty unrefined the skeleton took a lot of time to draw and the meaning behind this piece was well thought out. The meaning being that no matter how many different layers on top we are, after all, all homo sapiens with skeletons.

Panda was a stencil I did freshmen year '11 My most recent stencil junior year '13

I have grown since my first stencil in many ways. Knowing that spray painting is not a 1 person job is the biggest technique I learned. In order to get clean crisp lines without it being fuzzy you must take sticks and hold down the small area that you are spray painting, and so on and so forth. My artistic vision has grown much since then as well. My first stencil is a simple panda, no meaning behind it. My cross-walk stencil sign has so much more artistic vision behind it. I did much planning and in result resulted in a much more intriguing art piece. The simple stencil is transformed from being a copy of a cross walk sign, to the sign itself with a completely different message. This new message is changed because of intertextuality; the message of an image being changed when another image is added to it. 4) This new way of learning was very effective for me. This is because it gives the students so much more artistic freedom. If a student has worked with a medium that they know they didn't enjoy using they don't have to use it again, therefore being more productive in the end. Also if a project was assigned and a student had a wonderful and innovative idea they don't have to do or use what most of the other students are doing or using. This new learning style has showed how creative all the art students can be! If you go back and compare art work from last year to the art work produced this semester, the amount of extreme creativity doesn't compare. If students are given the same theme and same medium, most students art work is going to look the same. But if the students are given a vague theme and use of all mediums, there are so many more options for the students, thus resulting in more variety in art work. I have really liked this new way of teaching and learning and I believe it is very effective.